I Want To Know That My Heart's Still Beating
by ArkQueetely
Summary: Melchior is stuck watching his best friend fall to pieces. Melchior/Moritz possibly one-sided .


_A/N: This was originally posted on LJ 8/23/07. It was a birthday gift for the LJ user formerly known as rawrfoo. It was a little further from where I'd usually venture from canon in such a short piece but it was a birthday gift so I'd let it slide. Title taken from Switchfoot -- "Awakening"_

Melchior adored rainy evenings. There was a kind of agitation about a thunderstorm that was simply fascinating. Melchior wasn't a musical sort of person -- he preferred words to the abstract language of song -- but there was something almost musical about a storm. The drumming of raindrops on the roof, the roar of thunder, sometimes a low rumble and sometimes an angry crash you could feel, thrillingly, in your bones. What Melchior would give for more evenings like this – sitting on his bed by the window, the lights off in his room, the outside dark despite the hour, a book laying, forgotten, in his lap.

Outside his window he could see Moritz with his quick stride, raindrops bouncing off his black umbrella, coming toward the house. Melchior wouldn't be out in this storm, but if Moritz wanted to get out of his house, and he did more and more lately, the clatter of thunder overhead was not likely to keep him away.

Minutes passed and Melchior heard the gentle knocking at his door frame, and he reluctantly rose to open it, meeting his mother's gaze with the detached sort of expression he was wont to have on days like these.

"Moritz is downstairs," she said. Her arms were crossed in a thoughtful way -- Melchior knew she was concerned. If his mother's mood was any reflection of Moritz's current state, this wasn't going to be a particularly cheery evening.

"Can you tell him to come up here?" he said, and she nodded, a cautioning look telling him things she neglected to voice.

Melchior settled in his desk chair, returning his gaze to the window, and it wasn't long before he heard Moritz's feet falling heavy on the stairs.

"Moritz," he said, a soft greeting as the other boy entered.

Everything about Moritz was tired. His steps dragged as he moved to perch on the edge of Melchior's bed, his face hung with the sullenness of the sleep deprived, and it was with a subdued, weary tone that he responded, "It's been raining all day."

"I've noticed," Melchior replied shortly.

Melchior was not a person who had much patience for other people's despair. He watched Moritz get worn down day by day by a depression Melchior could not find logic for, and he was frustrated by Moritz's unannounced visits, where they could spend hours like this, on opposing sides of the room while Melchior vainly tried to make conversation in hopes that it might prompt Moritz to share his thoughts – and whether he would or wouldn't was arbitrary.

"I never did care for the rain," Moritz said gloomily, climbing onto Melchior's bed to stare out the water-streaked window. Breathing a heavy sigh, Melchior wondered whether Moritz had even come here to see him, or just to be here.

He was always faced with the dreaded feeling that he was the only friend Moritz had, and that Moritz came here looking to him to give him some kind of comfort, and Melchior didn't know what to give. Despite this frustration, however, the thought that they weren't even trying anymore, that this was just a formality, sat heavy in this throat.

Moritz leaned his head against Melchior's wall, his attention on nothing in particular, his arms hugging his sides. Melchior's eyes traveled over his friend's profile, over the curve of his shoulders, along the vulnerable lean of his spine. There were days when he wanted to grab that slightly fragile form and shake it, to scream at Moritz and get it into his head how sick Melchior was of seeing him lying on his bed in a ball like a dejected child, refusing to put forth more effort to fix himself. Other days, Melchior longed to caress him, to hold him in his arms and whisper in his ear everything he needed to hear, to press gentle kisses against his neck. Melchior was not sure yet which category today fell into.

A sudden flash of lightning made Moritz sit up suddenly. He looked over at Melchior with those tired eyes, and Melchior felt that lump in his throat again. He felt compelled to do something, say something, but the moment passed in a still silence and Moritz gazed out the window again.

In his lap, Melchior clenched his fists for a moment. He couldn't help but think that there had been a time when he hadn't attached so much gravity to Moritz, when he could've broken this silence easily. He missed the days when they would sit under a tree or wander down the path, talking until necessity forced them home. He wondered if that's what Moritz needed now – the meandering chatter that had been the staple of their unexpected friendship. He, however, wasn't sure if he could muster that in the face of this solemnity.

He tried to keep himself from thinking too hard, or thinking at all, but his mind was racing all different directions as he cautiously stood. What if he tried to talk to Moritz and things turned to an argument -- and his temper got the better of him? What if he found out something he didn't want to hear? What if he went over there and accomplished nothing at all and had no options left to explore?

In his preferred image, Moritz would not see the way he so timidly approached the bed, but Melchior was not often so lucky. He found himself caught in Moritz's questioning gaze as he sat beside him on the bed.

The only words Melchior could muster felt like a cliché on his tongue. "Are you okay?"

And, of course, Moritz's quick but weary response was, "I'm fine."

Moritz looked away and Melchior ran an absent hand through his hair. After a slow breath Melchior tried again, his voice softer, less accusatory. "Why did you come here, Moritz? In the rain?"

Moritz shrugged, leaning his head against the wall again.

"Did something happen?" Melchior pressed, and in an action that startled even himself despite his intention of spontaneity, he reached over to rest a hand on Moritz's thigh. Moritz's eyes fell on Melchior's fingers, and in a sudden fit of self-consciousness, Melchior drew them back.

Moritz pressed his lips together for a moment, and then quietly but decisively answered, "I talked back to my mother, and, well... I didn't want to be there when my father came home to find out about it." The words were even, matter-of-fact, but Melchior was taken aback by not only the idea of Moritz being anything but the timid boy he thought he knew, but the fact that Moritz was volunteering this information.

Moritz shrugged and wrung his hands nervously. "I used to feel better about things when I came here," he admitted, shrugging yet again.

"Used to?" Melchior said, though he didn't need to ask.

Moritz avoided Melchior's gaze, staring instead down at his hands. Melchior had the painful impression that Moritz was saying these things freely now not because he was looking to make some kind of amends, but rather, because he felt that things were too far gone for it to matter anymore.

Several minutes passed in which Melchior thought very carefully about the possible consequence of what he was considering.

With some hesitation, Melchior leaned over and, a little clumsily, kissed Moritz on the cheek.

Moritz jerked back and looked at Melchior with an expression that was a little confused and certainly startled. It was not a reaction Melchior would've found otherwise favorable, but for the first time since he'd entered the room that day, Melchior thought he saw life in Moritz's eyes. It was a life he wanted badly to cling to.

"Let's go out in the rain," Melchior said, tugging at Moritz's arm, "before it gets too dark."

"The rain?" Moritz stuttered out. "There's lightning – and if I come home soaked..."

"Your parents are going to be upset with you anyway!" At the way Melchior grinned recklessly, Moritz's face seemed to light up just a little.

Moritz continued to fumble for words, but as Melchior tugged on his arm again, he gave in and let Melchior drag him downstairs.

Later, Moritz would come home, soaking wet, to face a bitter argument. Melchior would go back to worrying about him whenever they were apart, which would be often. The two would continue to struggle to maintain conversation, and the awkwardness between them would still linger.

For that moment, however, the only thing against them was the rain – and Melchior did adore rainy evenings.


End file.
